4.29.2005

Notwithstanding the Euro-centerdness of history in the last century or two, the most far-reaching events in the next century will take place in East Asia (I believe). I discovered an excellent blog by Kotaji on China, Japan and the Koreas. Have read only a couple of posts before I leave for work, but its already very, very interesting!

Scary... and it's gonna happen again

The student demonstrators set off from Haidian, the university quarter of Beijing. They chanted anti-Japanese slogans and handed out leaflets to the crowd. Onlookers were moved to join them, and when the demonstration turned violent, the students were treated as nationalist heroes.

The year was 1919, the occasion the discovery that, under a secret agreement with the signatories of the Treaty of Versailles, the former German concessions in China would not revert to Beijing but be handed to Japan. Last weekend, students set off again from Haidian shouting anti-Japanese slogans. The demonstration ended with a violent attack on the Japanese embassy. Anti-Japanese resentment spilled over the next day into the southern cities of Guangzhou and Shenzhen, and in Shanghai two Japanese students were beaten up. The rising tensions of east Asia have spilled on to the streets.

There is a direct historical line between the students of 1919 and those of last weekend. In 1919, China was weak and humiliated, Japan an ascendant power that would soon invade and brutally occupy much of China. After Japan's defeat in 1945 there was no apology for the appalling slaughter of civilians in Nanjing, the germ warfare experiments or the sexual crimes against Chinese women. Japanese textbooks have continued to give a partial and one-sided account, but China - no saint when it comes to historical accuracy - did not protest. Under Mao, the history of the relationship was papered over in a show of friendship.

If the resentment is now back on the streets, it is because China's rise is shifting the geopolitical tectonic plates, offering a direct challenge to Japan's economic dominance of east Asia and to the strategic dominance the US has enjoyed, with its major ally Japan, since 1945.

4.03.2005

First stirrings

Been a big day today, newswise. India defeated Pak by 87 runs in that proxy-war called cricket. Fun to watch too, this jung. Although, if I watch it too long, India starts losing. Saw the match from Yuvraj's wicket to Balaji's. Long enough to know better than to jinx my side.